Time and project management applications, such as those that allow for the creation and management of a calendar are well known. Applications such as Microsoft Outlook enable a user to create calendar entries (such as appointments and meetings), and to further manage such entries (e.g., editing the calendar entries). Additionally, many such programs (including Outlook) incorporate ‘To Do List’-type applications or features, whereby a list of items can be generated. Such a list serves as a reminder to a user to accomplish the listed items, upon which the user can designate a particular item as ‘completed,’ thus removing it from the list.
While such applications may suffice in certain constant and predictable scenarios, they generally do not properly account for the fact that not all tasks are of equal importance. Accordingly in such existing applications, all items are presented in a sequential or chronological manner, without regard for the fact that certain of the items are more important than others.
In addition, when unexpected circumstances arise (which can happen frequently to certain users) existing applications are often ill equipped. For example, at any given times certain items may be completed (and thus should be removed from a list and/or calendar) while other previously scheduled items remain incomplete, and thus must be rescheduled. It can be appreciated that in such traditional applications, any scheduling or rescheduling operations must be performed manually by the user. For example, if a scheduled item is not completed at the initially designated time/date, traditional scheduling applications require that the user manually adjust the scheduling parameters of the item in order to reschedule it to another time/date. Additionally, given that in traditional applications the burden of rescheduling uncompleted tasks rests solely on the user, such tasks can be easily overlooked and/or forgotten about once their initially scheduled time has passed.
Moreover, existing time and project management applications are generally configured to achieve only the limited scheduling functions for which they are configured. Accordingly, users traditionally refer to such scheduling applications to identify a particular item to perform, and then such users must proceed to take further steps to actually perform the scheduled item (e.g., manually place a phone call or compose an email message), resulting in considerable inefficiency over time. Also, such applications generally do not define or otherwise identify a particular time during which a particular task can and/or should be performed or completed.
Additionally, traditional ‘To Do List’ applications generally require that a user manually indicate when a particular item on the list has been completed. Accordingly, users must generally expend additional effort to return to such an application only to indicate that a particular item has been completed. Such extra steps, though necessary, result either in inefficiency (on the part of users who conscientiously mark their items upon completion), or lack of accuracy (on the part of users who are less conscientious and thus do not manually indicate the completion of each item as completed).
It can be further appreciated that traditional applications are configured to schedule items in relatively rigid ways. That is, a meeting expected to take two hours will generally be scheduled as such, after which the schedule is free and another task can be scheduled. However, in reality, the ability of a user to accurately estimate the amount of time that one or more items might take on a given day can vary widely from day to day. For instance, despite diligent planning and time estimation, during the initial stages of a project various changes and/or unexpected events can often arise, resulting in delays, time overruns, etc. Conversely, during the later stages of a project, fewer delays, overruns, etc. are expected. However, current static scheduling applications are unable to effectively account for this discrepancy.
As such, it can be appreciated that existing applications do not enable a user to effectively schedule/plan the totality of the various tasks and items that the user must attend to in a dynamic manner.
It is with respect to these and other considerations that the disclosure made herein is presented.